Spe Salvi - On Christian Hope

by Susanne Lehne

Brussels (30th March 2008).- Last November 2007 Pope Benedict XVI published his second encyclical on the subject of Christian hope. In the first part, the Pope traces the concept of hope in the Bible and shows how it seems almost interchangeable with faith in many instances. For early Christians the decision to be baptised was a conscious life choice and it was more palpable for them than for many of us (unless we became Christians through the adult catechumenate), that in their discovery of God in Christ they had found life-changing hope and redemption. Far from simply giving a historical account, the Holy Father wishes to show that Christianity still offers the same life-transforming and life-sustaining hope to us today. By giving several examples from the Church Fathers and the lives of saints, he argues that when taken seriously the Christian message is not just informative, but “performative” – “good news” in fact, which affects not only what we believe but the way we live.

In the Pope’s estimation the present crisis of faith is closely correlated to a crisis of hope. He traces the historical development of the concept of faith in progress and human ingenuity, in science and technology, which ultimately led to atheism and the life-destructive ideologies and wars of the 20th century. For Pope Benedict the growing dominion of reason, coupled with the illusion of perfect freedom from any dependency on the divine, caused humans to believe in the emergence of a new world order, a “kingdom of man”, supplanting the earlier notion of the “Kingdom of God.” The Holy Father affirms that reason is indeed invaluable to humans, but it is God’s gift and needs to be integrated with moral judgment and the saving power of faith. He asserts that “progress, in order to be progress, needs moral growth on the part of humanity… otherwise, man’s situation, in view of the imbalance between his material capacity and the lack of judgement in his heart, becomes a threat for him and for creation (23).” 

The Pope cautions that while there can be continuous progress in the material sphere of mastery over nature, there can be no corresponding steady progression in the sphere of ethical awareness and moral decision-making, since every human being has to make new decisions and is free to reject the accumulated wisdom of previous generations. While we can build on the knowledge and experience of our ancestors and contribute to the search for better structures, no structures or codes can definitively guarantee a ‘good’ state of the world, since that would deny our freedom. The encyclical applauds the great contributions of science, but insists upon its limits, since “it is not science that redeems man: man is redeemed by love (25).” 

As Christians, we ought to be engaged in a community-oriented vision of building up this world, both in practical and spiritual ways. The Holy Father takes modern Christianity to task for retreating too much into the private sphere and restricting its horizon of hope to the individual and his or her salvation, forgetting that being in communion with Jesus means sharing in his way of “being for all,” in his commitment towards a life lived for others. True hope, according to Pope Benedict, is grounded in an encounter and a relationship with God is Christ. It is a hope that we cannot attain by ourselves, but that is bestowed upon us as a gift. The Kingdom of God “is not an imaginary hereafter, situated in a future that will never arrive; his Kingdom is present wherever he is loved and wherever his love reaches us (31).”

In the final section, the Holy Father discusses three settings for learning and practising hope. Firstly, he stresses that ongoing prayer – both private and communal - is an essential way of purifying our selfish hopes and growing in awareness of true hope. Secondly, he suggests that action and suffering, our daily struggles to persevere in the face of multiple discouragements, are all potential ways in which we learn to cultivate Christian hope. Finally, the encyclical concludes with reflections on the problem of evil and innocent suffering and the meaning of the Final Judgement. We are reminded that in Jesus Christ “God reveals his true face in the figure of the sufferer who shares [our] godforsaken condition by taking it upon himself (43).” In an utterly paradoxical and mysterious way, such a God can create justice. In his death and resurrection Christ opened a new future for us, which impinges upon our present and has the potential of gradually transforming it. This gives us grounds for lasting hope and the courage to persevere against all odds. 

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